In recent years, the research of fodder additives is moving towards the direction of non-residue, non-drug resistance and improvement of human health and the environment. Weaned piglets can only rely on fodder to meet nutritional needs, and their digestive and immune system is not fully developed. When coupled with early weaning caused psychological, environmental and nutritional stress, a series of problems of early weaned piglets appear including reduction of immune function and diarrhea, some even lead to death, which affect the economic benefits of farmers and companies.
At present, the piglet fodder additives market is uneven in quality, some of them cause economic losses to companies and farmers. Many farmers were promoted by advertisements of the manufactures to add additives no matter whether they are needed, regardless of livestock and poultry varieties and physiological period. They even believe that the more varieties used, the better effect they will get, which results not only the missing of the expected effect, but also reduction of the production, or even poisoning and diseases. Even worse, long term abuse of drugs and growth promoter, in particular antibacterial drugs, would result in appearance of drug-resistant pathogenic bacteria in livestock and poultry products, which directly endanger human health. In recent years, some meat products have been re-treated from the international market, due to the addition of some additives in the fodder that does not meet the requirements, resulting in serious economic losses and impact. In addition, under the situation that there are enough supply in the market, people are concerned about the quality of food. Thus, pollution-free “green” livestock and poultry products are desired. To produce “green” livestock and poultry products, we must use the green fodder additives.
Therefore, the development of new fodder additives is critical to improve the immunity and the disease resistance of weaned piglets, control the mortality rate of weaned piglets, and provide a more balanced nutrition to weaned piglets.